My cycling month in review: August 2014

A new month is upon us and, as I always do on the first day of the month, this morning I’m going to review some of my cycling highlights, personal records and totals from the previous month.

August was hot as blazes, but that didn’t stop me from riding: it was my biggest month on the bike in just about every measurable way!

Before I get into the numbers, here’s my Cycling Photo of the Month for August 2014 (click to enlarge):

My favorite photo from August 2014 was this shot, which I took on the 4th. The storms rolled in towards the end of the ride, and made for a dramatic photograph (and a wet finish!)

New Cycling Personal Records: Monthly and Weekly Totals for Distance/Elevation/Time

New personal records were set in August for all of the monthly categories (distance, elevation and time), breaking the three personal records I set in July. August 2014 was the first month in which I rode more than 2,000 kilometers, and so I was very happy to have added that notch to my cycling cap. I also set a new single-week elevation PR.

Other Cycling Personal Records & Achievements

Over the past month I set a total of 37 cycling personal records for time on various Strava segments.

For Strava’s August 2014 Monthly Training Series (MTS) I rode more kilometers than 99.322% of Strava MTS cyclists worldwide, placing 964 out of a total of 142,138 athletes with 2,051.11 kilometers ridden from August 1st – August 31st. This is my highest MTS placing to date.

My Training Calender: August 2014

My August 2014 Training Calender

VeloViewer Score

I’ve been using the awesome Strava companion site VeloViewer for quite some time now (in fact, that’s where some of the stats and charts in these monthly reports are obtained). If you’re a Strava cyclist who craves even more ways to crunch your ride data, then you owe it to yourself to check out Veloviewer. There’s a lot there, so explore and have some fun.

One of the features of VeloViewer that I really like is its innovative and unique VeloViewer Score.

The VeloViewer Score is a cool way for Strava users to compare themselves against other cyclists: It is the average segment position score from a cyclist’s top 25% (up to a maximum of 100) non-downhill segments. What I like about the VeloViewer Score is that it’s derived based on an algorithm that actually weights the number of other athletes who have also ridden the segments. In other words, VeloViewer understands and takes into account that a KOM with only 20 cyclists on the leaderboard is nowhere near as impressive as a KOM with 1,000 cyclists on the leaderboard.

Because of the way the VeloViewer Score is computed, it’s a unique method for cyclists who live far apart and never ride the same segments to compare their overall performances.

Go create your own VeloViewer account (it’s free) and see how you stack up with your Strava friends across the globe!

My VeloViewer Score is 98.59 as of August 31, 2014.

2014 Goals Progress

In late 2013 I publicly announced a couple of cycling distance and elevation goals for 2014. Those goals were to ride at least 10,000 kilometers (6,214 miles) with more than 160,000 feet of elevation. Earlier this year I added the additional goal of riding my bike every single day in 2014. We’re now 66.30% of the way through 2014, so let’s see how I’m doing:

I like that I’ve ascended more a quarter million feet on my bike in eight months. Not too shabby for a Florida boy.

When I established these distance and elevation goals in late 2013, they were considerably higher than anything I’d ever done before. Because I’ve reached both of those goals so quickly, I have significantly revised them. I am now shooting for 20,000 kilometers (12,427 miles) with 360,000 feet of elevation.

I am currently 67.28% of the way to my revised distance goal of 20,000 kilometers, and I am 69.68% of the way to my revised elevation goal of 360,000 feet.

My 2014 riding streak continues, and I have ridden my bike every single day for 244 days straight (at least one ride every day from December 31, 2013 forward). My criteria for this challenge can be found here.

I’ve spent a total of 443 hours in the saddle so far in 2014.

Here are comparisons of my distance and elevation for 2012, 2013 and 2014 YTD (click to enlarge):

Distance comparison: 2012, 2013 and 2014 YTD

Elevation comparison: 2012, 2013 and 2014 YTD

Power Output Personal Records

Here’s a look at my current power curve (click to enlarge), followed by a chart with my actual power output personal records at various time intervals.

My power curve as of August 2014

I set a total of 7 new power output personal records in August, and set new FTP personal record of 291 watts.

While increasing my power, in August I also dropped from 73.57 kg (162.2 pounds) to 72.6655 kg (160.2 pounds), further increasing my power-to-weight ratio. My new FTP combined with my weight loss has produced a new FTP/kg of 4.0–another new personal record.

Here’s my complete power output chart (my current power chart can always be found in the “Cycling” section on the main menu, above):

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